Boris Johnson uses new-look Guardian for act of epic trolling

Written by David Singleton on 16 January 2018 in Diary

Diary

It come as readers are still getting used to the new format.

The Guardian’s redesign and tabloid format has been praised by a number of readers, but one was taken aback by a page 3 shot of celebrities at catwalk show. Or as Lindsay Buckell of Beeston put it: "A picture of four women in a row with bare legs on display and in one case quite a lot of cleavage.

In today’s letters section, another loyal Guardianista suggests that a divorce with her husband of 50 years could be on the cards "as there is no way of separating out the sport section from the news".

So how will traumatised Remain-voting readers respond to the new-look paper being used as a launchpad for epic trolling by the foreign secretary?

In an exclusive interview with Guardian political editors Heather Stewart and Anushka Asthana, Boris Johnson says his widely discredited claim that membership was costing the UK £350m per week was wrong. It will be more like £438m by the end of the 2021 transition period, he suggests.

In comments flagged up on the front page, Johnson says: "There was an error on the side of the bus. We grossly underestimated the sum over which we would be able to take back control."

On the Guardian’s liveblog, political correspondent Andrew Sparrow had the foreign secretary banged to rights.

"It is only Tuesday, but it is already clear that the wind-up of the week prize goes to Boris Johnson," he stated.